The Feud: Vladimir Nabokov, Edmund Wilson, and the End of a Beautiful Friendship

Review

"Beam's book evokes the strangely satisfying sensation of witnessing smart people bickering over seemingly small matters. It also provides a fascinating behind-the-scenes glimpse, full of anecdotal ephemera, of how Wilson and Nabokov interacted and why. But the more lasting sensation is the bittersweetness of this portrait of a fallen friendship—at its height, Nabokov wrote to Wilson, 'You are one of the few people in the world whom I keenly miss when I do not see them.' "

?? Publishers Weekly, starred review

“A shrewd, affectionate, and wildly engrossing account of one of the greatest and most ridiculous smackdowns in literary history. There came a time, in the feud between Nabokov and Wilson, when the former effected the removal from his books of blurbs written by the latter. Among the many delights of Beam's telling of the tale is his unerring acuity, in knowing the nonsense for nonsense, and the heartbreak for misery.”

?? Jill Lepore

2016秋冬散文和文学批评十本大书亮相

Clash of the Titans! The deliciously ironic (and sad) tale of how two literary giants destroyed their friendship in a fit of mutual pique and egomania.

In 1940 Edmund Wilson was the undisputed big dog of American letters. Vladimir Nabokov was a near-penniless Russian exile seeking asylum in the States. Wilson became a mentor to Nabokov, introducing him to every editor of note, assigning to him book reviews for The New Republic, engineering a Guggenheim. Their intimate friendship blossomed over a shared interest in all things Russian, ruffled a bit by political disagreements. But then came Lolita, and suddenly Nabokov was the big (and very rich) dog. Finally the feud erupted in full when Nabokov published his hugely footnoted and virtually unreadable literal translation of Pushkin's famously untranslatable verse novel Eugene Onegin. Wilson attacked his friend's translation with hammer and tong in The New York Review of Books. Nabokov counterattacked in the same publication. Back and forth the increasingly aggressive letters volleyed until their friendship was reduced to ashes by the narcissism of small differences.

(With black-and-white illustrations throughout)

ALEX BEAM is a columnist for The Boston Globe and a former Moscow correspondent. He is the author of two novels about Russia, Fellow Travelers and The Americans are Coming!, as well as three works of nonfiction: American Crucifixion; Gracefully Insane; and A Great Idea at the Time, the latter two both New York Times Notable Books. He has also written for the International Herald Tribune, The Atlantic, Slate, and Forbes/FYI. He lives in Newton, Massachusetts with his wife and three sons.

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